"UC3M Study Finds a Mathematical Link Between Sociopolitical Event and Advanced Cyberattacks"
An interdisciplinary team of researchers from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) has developed a mathematical model that can help explain certain advanced state-sponsored cyberattacks based on various sociopolitical variables. This development is the first step toward achieving the goal of predicting the occurrence of cyberattacks. The team analyzed Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) and investigated whether there is a link between cyberattacks and specific strategic, economic, and military events. Although there was some attribution of these APTs' intentions, there was no mathematical link that would allow these attacks to be modeled until now. The researchers' work suggests that this link can be established. According to one of the study's authors, lecturer José Mara de Fuentes, the model is based on information published by the media and other economic indicators to explain the occurrence of APTs. The reasons for these cyberattacks vary greatly. They are far more sophisticated than those that can harm ordinary users and are typically used to commit intellectual property theft or espionage. This research opens the door to future lines of work, such as predicting cyberattacks through observing other variables that have nothing to do with the cyber world. In some cases, data on the level of exports, such as mobile phones, can be used to determine whether a cyberattack is likely to occur in a given country. According to the researchers, this work is interdisciplinary and integrates geopolitical factors with data on cyberattacks, and combines all of this with a mathematical perspective. This article continues to discuss the study on identifying key relationships between nation-state cyberattacks and geopolitical and economic factors.